Here There Be Monsters
by Cerulean.Phoenix7
Summary: It's an endless void, full of nothing but ripe with dark potential.


Here There Be Monsters

A/N: This is based off of the Doctor's conversation with Neelix in the episode 5.01 "Night". This is set briefly after that episode. I wrote this as a venture into some introspection on the Doctor's character; hopefully I make the grade.

Thanks to Uroboros75 for the beta work :)

Music: Ships in the Night – Immediate Music

Disclaimer: I don't own it. Nadda.

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><p>He sets the tricorder down before he speaks, as allowing the object to fall hastily to the ground in his absence would not be proper; continual wear and tear of that ilk will only cause them to fall into disrepair more rapidly. Such treatment of material is something that he has never considered because it would be improper.<p>

He _never_ allows himself to be improper.

The Captain had only just left sickbay before he set the tricorder aside, having used it for her routine physical (which he'd finally convinced her to come in for, after witnessing the _n_th cup of coffee in her hand today). Kathryn Janeway is one of the most resilient and determined individuals that he's ever encountered in his holographic existence; it is probably why he considers her stubbornness to be comparable to that of a Vulcan.

There are other such crew members who exhibit other… _peculiarities_. However, he dismisses them to be merely the product of the highly-praised notion of 'human individuality' (at least, that's what he hopes is to blame). He isn't sure that the antics of Mr. Paris could be explained otherwise.

He pauses before he utters the words to the Computer, for there is one particular moment that troubles him slightly. From the endless vault of memories cached away in the recesses of his programming he recalls a particular conversation, and a word that now draws more intrigue than he'd previously thought.

_Nihilophobia._

He'd made an observation about his own experience with such a phenomenon, though not on the same scale as Mister Neelix; he still found the void that he was whisked into upon deactivation to be slightly… disconcerting.

The void never used to trouble him; he would simply reside there as free energy and whorls of programming until activated again. There was no ambiguity about the void to him; it had merely been a resting place, a sort of cybernetic limbo.

Then he began tinkering with the limits of his program, stretching and contorting the subroutines like a photonic rubber band. He chose the upgrades that he made, but he wonders if there are a few unwanted things that came along with them. With awareness comes curiosity, and curiosity always seems to be the trip wire leading to so many deadly traps.

He has noticed a few strange things in the void when he disappears there; he sees nothing, but wonders if something else _could_ be there in that cybernetic abyss. The lack of definition holds potential for the formation of myriad shapes and forms. If he's been dematerialized into this temporary oblivion, who's to say that something else won't form in that abyss from the photons of his program? He has no control over things like these; he is the master of his own domain, but not those who enter it.

He feels a little trepidation towards deactivation now. Just because something has not appeared the last one thousand and forty-seven times that he's shimmered into the void doesn't mean one won't appear _this time_.

He's never really considered the human predilection for lying in certain moments, but now he realizes that he may have told a slight fib. He'd told Neelix that one simply gets used to a place like the void, but how does one adapt to a place that has the potential to morph into anything? He's not one to daydream (_that_'_s_ a subroutine he's still waffling over), but he cannot help but acknowledge that within everything there is _potential_, and within that –more importantly – is _possibility._

Then, he realizes something else:

He _lied_.

The very notion of that makes him stop, his form frozen over the console. Part of his programming is to tell patients everything with honesty, no matter the condition. To lie is to be…_improper_.

The shock is brief, and quickly trumped, he finds, by another notion that he has; he's occasionally seen other members of the crew consoling one another over things such as fears, but it's never been a social ritual that he's been privy to.

At least, until now.

He wonders for an instant if this is the so-called 'compassion' that he's heard mentioned in passing; he'd never really considered it. He's there to do his job and nothing more, but even a hologram may desire to live beyond their photonic boundaries. He simply wanted Mister Neelix to stop fretting (as he figured that it doesn't bode well for crew morale when the Morale Officer himself is out of commission). Is that really so _wrong_? He thinks that it surely can't be; he's supposed to try and keep patients in better spirits as well, and what's the harm in a little sympathy when it produces a smile?

His scans his eyes over the console, fingers resting just at the edge of curved interface, before he thinks back to the cybernetic void that he's about to fling himself into once again. Is it really proper for him to be so concerned about this? He can't stay on permanently, but he has the right to curiosity, doesn't he?

He supposes that it isn't really proper for him to question any of his programming at all; he was never meant to have that capability. He's been granted a sample of humanity's elixir, which in turn has offered him a glimpse of things left untouched by the holographic world. He's developed beyond his limits, and he wonders how much farther he can progress before things start to regress.

In the case of the void, he thinks that awareness of that is something that he could live without. The darkness is everlasting, eternal; it seeps into every corner of his existence and he cannot halt its progression. He's tried to accept it, but it still irks something inside him every time. He's learned that adaptation is never a permanent action; it is simply a method to push aside the inevitable in the foolish hope of progress. Those are the monsters of human ambition; they drive people to the brink of no return and then push them into an abyss that they can barely escape from. Being a hologram, he is not subject to such wicked twists of fate, but even so, he can still see their potential paths forming and the threads uncoiling across the path of progress. A moral trip-wire always seems to be the downfall of many with no distinct choice of victim; whoever happens down that road at any particular time may just be rather unlucky.

He should be so fortunate that fate seems to pass over persons of a holographic nature in favour of the flesh-and-blood folk, but he wonders if such a thing is almost selfish. He is untouched while his friends and colleagues are scathed by the fiery hand of something that they have no control of. He hasn't suffered to some of the extents of the crew; granted there have been instances of his program being invaded or tampered, but nothing as harmful as being subject to strange experiments, or abandonment on a hostile planet. He's seen some of these affects pass through the crew, jumping from each person like a virus, and yet it is still a mystery to him.

It seems that a great part of the human experience is suffering.

But why would such a thing truly be necessary? Is pain always required? As a physician, he swears by the Hippocratic Oath; the phrase "do no harm" is branded into his subroutines. He wonders if something comes from such an experience, if it changes people in some way. There are records of people's lives drastically changing after such an experience, and he supposes that for the sake of progress that change must be instigated.

He takes one last look at the console where his mobile emitter rests, pillowed in its security and advanced technology. To wear the emitter is to wear freedom, and that change is something that he is truly grateful for.

He surmises that in return, a little suffering on his own part is only fair.

His hands fall to his sides and his shoulders drop calmly; he cannot be left running.

"Computer..." he begins; then, taking a virtual breath, he finishes. "Deactivate EMH program."

It is, after all, the proper thing to do.

_Fin_

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><p><strong>Please review :)<strong>


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